Date Proposal
by fbeauchamphartz
Summary: Kurt is Sebastian's go-to guy when it comes to getting ready for a big date. Sebastian sees it as Kurt's 'life mission' to aid the fashion challenged, but it tears Kurt apart to watch his best friend get ready to hook up with someone else - especially tonight, when Sebastian confesses he might have finally found 'the one'. Kurtbastian. Kurt H. Sebastian S.
**A/N: Light angst, fluff, romance. Dalton AU where Kurt and Sebastian are the same age, attending Dalton at the same time. No mention of Blaine.**

"So, should I go with the black or the grey?" Sebastian asks, holding two shirts up in front of his torso for Kurt's perusal.

"The black," Kurt answers glumly.

"Really?" Sebastian says, looking over both options in his full-length mirror. "I like the grey." He lays the grey shirt carefully on his bed and hangs the black one back in his closet. "Now, ties…" He grabs two neckties off the rack on his closet door. "Do I go with the purple" – He holds it up to his neck – "or the green?"

"The purple," Kurt says with no thought and even less enthusiasm than he did with the shirt.

"Hmm…" Sebastian holds the two ties against the grey shirt he's chosen. "I like the green. You always say it brings out the color of my eyes. Makes 'em pop."

"So go with the green," Kurt mumbles, eyes focused on the bookcase against the far wall, mentally reciting titles he's read hundreds of times under similar circumstances. Helping Sebastian prepare for his Friday night dates is like some sort of New Age sadism. Every time Sebastian goes out with a new guy, he calls Kurt in for a fashion consultation. Kurt doesn't see why. Sebastian has more designer clothes hanging in his closet than Kurt does, and besides - Sebastian doesn't have to worry about how he styles his hair or what he wears. He would look dashing dressed in a moth-eaten burlap sack and Birkenstock sandals.

In Kurt's opinion, anyway.

"Let's move on to shoes," Sebastian says, opening the second door to his closet where he keeps a collection of footwear that would make Carrie Bradshaw pea green with envy. "The Ferragamo loafers or the Oxfords?"

"Go with the loafers," Kurt replies without looking at either pair.

"I was thinking the Oxfords." Sebastian bends over and picks them up, putting them on his bedspread alongside the ensemble he's already assembled. He puts a finger to his chin, looks back in his closet at the discarded articles Kurt chose, and scowls. "You were just picking the first thing I showed you!"

"What does it matter?" Kurt gripes. "You're picking the opposite of everything I pick!"

"You're supposed to be helping me, Kurt," Sebastian complains, picking up the grey shirt and taking it off its hanger. "Isn't that what you do? Flitter around, helping the style-challenged coordinate their weekend outfits?"

"Why are you wearing a suit anyway?" Kurt asks. "Are you guys going to the country club or something?"

"Actually, this isn't a date," Sebastian says, slipping into the shirt and busily doing the buttons. "It's a _pre_ -date."

Kurt pulls a face. "What does that even mean?" He turns his eyes away as Sebastian starts stripping off his sweat pants. _Must be nice_ , Kurt thinks, _to be so comfortable in your own skin that you can drop trou anywhere_. Not that Kurt would, even if he had anything close to Sebastian's physique. He's fond of modesty. Still…it'd be nice to feel he _could_.

"It means that I haven't asked the guy yet. That's what the suit's all about. I want it to be…you know…special."

"Like a proposal?"

"God," Sebastian rolls his eyes while he pulls on his dress slacks, "only _you_ would put it that way."

"Wow," Kurt says with an infusion of jealousy. "I thought you usually just showed up at a guy's room, said, "Date, _now_ ," and he followed you around like a lovesick Dalmatian." Kurt watches too closely as Sebastian slips the green tie underneath his collar. He's right. That British racing green does make the color in Sebastian's eyes stand out beautifully. "You must really like this guy to go to this kind of trouble."

"Oh, yeah," Sebastian says in a dreamy way that makes Kurt want to barf. "This guy's smart, witty, fun, _hot_. Plus, I think he really gets me."

"When did you learn all of that?" Kurt scoffs. "On line at The Lima Bean? Or in the bathroom at Scandals?"

"Insult me all you want, you frigid spinster, but I have a good feeling about this one." A sheepish grin slips on to Sebastian's face as he tightens the Windsor knot in his tie. "Actually, I've known him for a while."

Kurt raises both brows in surprise, trying not to look as hurt as he feels. "Why haven't you told me about him?"

"I wasn't ready," Sebastian admits. "But I think…this date is long overdue." He straightens his tie and tugs at his cuffs, then turns away from the mirror to present himself to Kurt for inspection. "What do you think?"

"I think…" Kurt sighs, more defeated than he's ever felt. He can barely stand watching his best friend hook up with nobody after nobody. But seeing him finally fall for someone, that's a different form of hell altogether. "I think you look amazing."

Sebastian smirks. "I do, don't I?"

"Yeah, you do," Kurt says, resisting the urge to go in for a friendly hug and heading for the door. "My work here is done. I think you can take it from here."

"What are your plans for the evening?" Sebastian asks as he reaches for his jacket, more conversational than interested.

"I'm going to go to my room and finish reading about The Massacre of Vassy," Kurt replies, furious that he doesn't have anything better planned, something that could counter Sebastian's romantic scheme to win over his new mystery Mr. Fantastic.

"That sounds sexy," Sebastian says with a giddy little laugh that bubbles up when he's excited about something. It's a laugh that only Kurt gets to hear, and right now, it's pinging around his body, shattering his insides with every ricochet.

"You know how much of a whore I am for a good religiously motivated blood bath," Kurt says, lingering in the doorway, feeling, as he has so many times before, that he's overstayed. "You have fun now, ya here? And don't do anything I wouldn't do."

"See, now, you're seriously limiting my choices."

"Ha-ha," Kurt deadpans, walking into the hallway. Sebastian's not one to 'kiss and tell', but Kurt's heard rumors, and being Sebastian's best friend, Sebastian's not shy about confirming them. Kurt doesn't want to consider what his best friend's _choices_ may include. He wraps his left arm over his chest, hand gripping his right bicep, and hugs himself tight, trying to soothe the dull ache in his chest.

An hour later, Kurt is cerebrum deep in the tragic details of the French army's attack against the Huguenots when he hears a staccato tap on his dorm room door. He looks over at his door. He's not really in the mood for visitors, but he's also not entirely in the mood to be alone. He needs a distraction, something more compelling than A.P. European History.

"One second," he says, slamming his heavy book shut and getting up to answer the door. "Who's there?"

"Uh…" He hears the stuttered sound of a single syllable, then a hawked _ahem_. "Kurt?"

Kurt's brow crinkles. "Sebastian?" He opens his door and there he is, dressed in a black suit and purple tie, loafers on his feet. The purple tie doesn't quite bring out the color of his eyes as dramatically as the green one does, but it warms his skin, emphasizes the rose in his cheeks. But why Sebastian's blushing, Kurt doesn't know. "You changed your suit," he observes, the thoughtful creases in his forehead deepening. "What are you doing here? Pre-date not go well?"

Selfishly, Kurt hopes not. He doesn't like having _that_ kind of competition, even though he knows he's not in the running. On the other hand, he doesn't want to be the one to comfort Sebastian because Mr. Incredible turned him down. He doesn't want to be the sounding board Sebastian uses when he tries to pin down what he did wrong and figure out a way to fix the problem. Kurt doesn't want to lob suggestion after suggestion on ways to win this guy back when what he really wants to do is ask Sebastian why he doesn't date him instead.

"Actually," Sebastian says, glancing at his feet, "I haven't exactly asked the guy out yet."

"Okay," Kurt says, no less puzzled. "So, why don't you get to it? Why are you here?"

Sebastian looks up at Kurt through his lashes, lightly tapping the toe of his polished shoe into the jamb of the door, until the silence that surrounds them goes from obvious to uncomfortable to ridiculous.

"Jesus Christ, Kurt!" Sebastian exclaims with a nervous chuckle. "Do I really have to spell it out for you?"

Kurt squints, utterly lost in his confusion. "Yeah," he says. "I think you do."

"Kurt, you and I have been best friends since we both started going to Dalton…"

"Actually," Kurt interrupts with a raised finger, "it took about five months. You spent the first semester being an ass to me…remember?"

"Apples and oranges," Sebastian says. It's not that he doesn't remember that time when Kurt first walked through the doors of Dalton – a public school transplant, trying to get away from the bullying at his old school, just to find Sebastian Smythe, who became his bully at this new school, which was supposed to be a safe haven against bullying. (The irony gave Kurt whiplash something fierce for months.) But somewhere in between the insults and the harassing, they realized they had things in common. They could appreciate one another's sense of humor. They had more things to talk about then just how much they thought they loathed one another.

They came to an understanding.

And then they became friends.

There was no real turning point. No big climactic reveal. They just became so comfortable around one another that the barbs they threw didn't really do damage anymore.

"The truth is," Sebastian says, "I've been trying for forever to find a way to ask you out."

"Why didn't you do it earlier?" Kurt asks, bitterly unconvinced. "You know, about three dozen one-night stands ago?"

"Because I didn't want to lose my best friend," he says, poised to take Kurt's hand but unsure whether or not he should. "Dick is everywhere, Kurt, but friends – really good ones – they're a little harder to find."

Kurt cocks his hip and tilts his head. "Did you read that in a greeting card or something?"

"Look," Sebastian laughs, mostly at his own corniness, "are you going to be an asshole, or are you going to go out with me?"

Kurt shrugs in disbelief. "Why me?"

"Because, I told you…" Sebastian takes a step forward, expecting Kurt to take a step back and let him in. But Kurt stands his ground, and Sebastian finds himself nose to nose with him, staring into remarkably bright and stinging blue eyes. Sebastian decides he likes this proximity much better. "You're smart…witty…fun… _hot_. Plus, you really get me."

"And nobody's really _gotten you_ before?" Kurt asks with a softened sarcasm.

"Nobody's really tried."

Kurt gazes into Sebastian's face, at humbled eyes that are usually coy, a sincere expression that's normally smug, at the boy Kurt gets to see behind closed doors, who rarely shows his face to anyone else.

"So, you really want to do this?" Kurt asks, coming to the quick realization that Sebastian's mouth is closer to his than it's ever been outside of his own silly daydreams. "You want to go out with me?"

Sebastian's lips, near enough to be kissed, curl into a half-grin. "I'm wearing a suit, aren't I?"


End file.
